Thursday, 17 May 2012

'Fancy looking at New Rift Pot?' said the text. 'OK' was my reply before I had checked on-line to see what New Rift Pot was. A quick Google and the first entry I looked at mentions 'Anyway with that little bit of drama out of the way I pursed up the next little bit of a pitch and headed out ... up the tight climbs' while the second entry from one 'Thursday Night Club' 10th Dec 2010 mentions, 'that even with moderate rain the crawl between the first and second pitches can become impassable ', and that Tom had not gone further than the first pitch and that Al had scared himself when the water backed up and flowed over his shoulders while he was trying to get out of the passage. Oh well, tight and wet, my least favourite caving activities, ought to go and give it a look!

So we walked in the light (novel activity) and were soon descending the dug rift where boards and scaffolding bars bulged with the strain of 30 years of holding back rubble. The modern techniques for shoring digs have come on a long way! At the bottom of the first pitch the crawl beckoned so we took off our SRT gear. The small passage was not too wet but the standing pools made for wet going. A couple of sections required the 'breathing out hard' technique to get the chest through narrow bits but the passage was never too constricted although the left bend did require some manoeuvring to position the body to go around it. We had been given the nod that the pitches were rigged so didn't have tackle bags of ropes, throwing the SRT kit ahead was hard enough but Al also had his large angular tackle bag of camera gear to manhandle through the narrows. Hard work!

In a tight bit!

The passage dropped into a slot and then descended through a tricky drop. to this point I had been leading but a look at the next section was too much for my fragile confidence. The tight looking corner and body shaped slot going downhill looked too much. I gave the lead to Al who shot off down with a 'I'll just have a look'! I sat in the dark listening to the sounds of his suit and strange rumbling sounds as he went through the constriction and on to the pitch head, whereupon he came back and announced that it was 'OK, just had to watch the hips as I came through the slot.' Problem is my chest is bigger than my hips and I don't like it when the only way through is to breathe out hard and then push. How will I get back? Anyway, panic controlled we carried on to the pitch head, which although a bit constricted opened out into a huge chamber called Coates Cavern.

The advice was 'go down the slope then up if you want to see the pretties'. Good advice as interesting caverns were explored that were huge compared to the tight way in. An active dig in one of the caverns was seen, which followed a small stream and seems to be a promising way on and may explain the in-situ ropes.

The return journey was not as bad as feared. Al makes a great stepladder and with combined tactics I got through the tight bits and up the climbs while he just seemed to come through them without problems. The biggest problem he had was lugging his camera tackle bag back through the crawl.

Back at the bottom of the first pitch I was confused by an unusual optical illusion. Above me was a bright light, Was it a caver descending? Was it the moon? No, it was daylight at the top of the pitch and sunshine! What an unusual way to end a caving trip - in the sun!